BootsnAll Travel Network



Three Days of the Condor

I did not eat condor for three days.  But I did visit their soaring grounds:  Cañon del Colca.  Canon del Colca and another canyon near it, Canon del Cotahuasi, are both over twice as deep as our own Grand Canyon.  So, they´re grander.  In fact, they´re believed to be the deepest canyons in the world.  So, grandest.

I set out on the three-day/two-night excursion at 5:00 a.m. on Wednesday, February 6, with a little trekking agency located in Arequipa called Eco Tours.  There were four trekkers total, plus our young guide Roy.  The others were Kevin, a New Yorker living in Argentina teaching English, and Simon and Marie, a young French Canadian couple.  A cab took me and the four twenty-somethings to the bus depot and we boarded a bus that hauled us five hours into canyon country, stopping at a pueblo called Cabanaconde.  There we ate lunch in a little restaurant and then began the trek. 

Below:  Shots from the Canon del Colca trek.

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We spent the day hiking downhill to the bottom of the canyon.  When we reached the river below (the Rio Colca), we hiked along it to a beautiful tropical village comprised of bamboo huts.  That´s where we ate and slept and enjoyed a solar-heated, bamboo-and-stone outdoor shower.

The next morning we trekked further into the canyon, taking sharp ascents and descents up and down.  The extended downhill hiking from the day before had ruined one of my knees, and on the second day I had to use two bamboo poles to allay the pain, just as my brother did on the Inca Trail.  But, thankfully, my stomach gave me no problems at all.  The poor Canadians weren´t so fortunate, though, each having to stop and vomit multiple times along the trail.  We stopped for lunch at a popular palm-fringed spot by the river called Sangalle, AKA the Oasis.  Then we spent the afternoon hiking all the way back up a neverending set of switchbacks to the rim of the canyon.

This took about three hours.  By the time we reached the top, the sun had set and we were hiking in the black of night through fields and over stone walls back to Cabanaconde.  I was exhausted, hungry and cold from the chilly wind blowing against my sweaty clothes.  I´d perspired so much, my moisture-wicking shirt had given up wicking moisture altogether and clung to me like a frightened baby chimpanzee.  When we finally traipsed into town, Kevin and I beelined it for the first shop we encountered and ate the best tasting Snickers bars ever sold.  Even after dinner, I couldn´t get warm, probably because my body had no energy left to heat me up.  So I went to bed early, happy to crawl underneath the heavy blankets.

As it happens, the good people of Cabanaconde were celebrating a festival that weekend, and, much like the good people of Puno and Copacabana, they displayed their merriment by marching and dancing through the town´s streets to the beat of several marching bands.  Bands that marched right past my hotel window.  Over and over.  Fortunately, I´d brought my ear plugs, and I fell asleep anyway, but that was primarily because of my fatigue and not the ear plugs.

Below:  Shots from around Cabanaconde (a Nacho Libre-style cart, the main street, a condor statue and a church archway).

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In the morning, I awoke to the pulsating cacophony of one of the marching bands that had apparently been going at it all night long.  The boom-booming eased me into the new day like a mallot to the cranium.  Occasionally, the band slowed the tempo, creating what could´ve been the soundtrack to a scene featuring a mob of drunks struggling to coax a reticent mule team along a dusty cobblestone alleyway.  Maybe gravity is stronger in canyon country, but it almost took a spatula to pry me out of bed.

After a quick breakfast, we boarded the bus back to Arequipa.  We made two stops on the way.  The first was at Cruz del Condor, a look-out area for condor spotting.  We actually saw two condors glide by, but they were far away and not within photographing distance.  Our second stop was in the town of Chivay.  There we stopped for a dip in the local hot springs, Aguas Calientes, and then had lunch.  We arrived back in Arequipa at dinnertime and stuck together for one more meal.

Below:  Shots of central Lima.

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The next morning, I took a plane to Lima, explored the capital city´s central area for a few hours, and then took another plane to Trujillo in the north.  I spent last night in a beach town near Trujillo called Huanchaco.  I´m still in Huanchaco and I really like it here.  It´s nice to be away from urban sprawl, and I just feel more at ease near the coast.  I´ve got a great room at Hotel Rivera with a view of the ocean.

Below:  Shots from around Huanchaco.

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Today is Sunday.  This morning I was walking along the main beachfront street when I recognized the tune of a praise song–but with Spanish lyrics–coming from the second floor of a building.  I found my way inside and ended up joining a group of about a dozen people, half of them small children, who were having a worship service.  As soon as I sat down, one of the men handed me a Spanish-English Bible, so I was able to understand the sermon that followed the music.  Afterwards, I chatted with an older guy named Gustavo.  A self-described “old surfer,” Gustavo told me how much his life has changed since he began following the Lord, having abandoned a lifestyle of drug abuse and wanton partying.  The young pastor and his helper also came over to me and said “hola” and offered to let me keep the bilingual Bible, but I left it there for other tourists to use.  The instant bond among fellow “believers” is always so heartening, like meeting family I didn´t know I had.  And the camaraderie, even if brief, refreshes the soul.



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